Premium Continents
The Premium Continents are a group of 4 continents with similar Geography. They are created to host premium homes. They don't appear on many maps and their creation is relatively new. They are created to host the Linden homes for premium residents. SLGI team gave these continents the transitory name C011 for Premium East, C012 for Premium South 1, C013 for Premium South 2 and C014 for Premium South 3. History Thanks to Gridsurvey, we can now track back Premium Continents to their formation date, by checking data for individual sims. The results are as follows: *Premium East: winter 2009 - spring 2010 *Premium South 1: winter 2010 - spring 2011 *Premium South 2: summer 2010 *Premium South 3: spring 2010 Also, it should be noted that the sims in Premium East were first named Nascera plus a designation number. That was the proposed name for Premium East. However, the name is not well known and majority of residents just call it one of the Premium Continents. The lack of Geographic knowledge has some large - scale confusions. First of all, many residents upgraded to premium in order to get a house on classic mainland continents and were surprised to get their home in the Premium Continents, not having any idea where they are. Second, not many people know what are the land permissions of a home in a premium continent. Location Premium 1 (or Premium East) appears in an older map as Nacera. It is situated East of Jeogeot, Southeast of Satori. If you look further East, you will get to Zindra. Premium South continents are places South to Jeogeot. Premium South 1 is the northern, Premium South 2 is between Premium south 1 and Premium South 3. Premium South 3 is the most southern continent, almost as remote as Zindra. Statistics Coordinates These Coordinates are in sims, as they can be found for every sim from Gridsurvey http://www.gridsurvey.com. The premium continents don't appear on most of the maps (except sometimes Premium East). They don't seem to have some distinct geographic features and it's difficult to separate them into subcontinents. They could, hoewver, be devided by the specific theme the premium homes have. So, the coordinates are given here for every continent and sometimes coordinates are also given for specific places inside a continent, but the continental mass is never divided into subcontinents. The numbers represent: longitude (min - max) / latitude (min - max). Premium 1 (Premium East): 1192-1215/907-926 Sandbox Area: 1192-1196/906-909 Premium Wilderness: 1187-1189/919-920 Central Dam: 1204/919 Canard sim Japanese Gardens: 1193-1193/911-912 Premium South 1: 1013-1028/811-828 Central Dam: 1021/822 Trona sim A park with scripts allowed: 1019/819 (Yreka sim) Premium South 2: 1000-1022/750-768 Sandbox Area: 1002-1003/760-761 Japanese Gardens: 1000/1000-754-755 Central Dam: 1011/762 (Long Dash sim) Premium South 3: 1000-1022/500-517 Sandbox Area: 1002-1003/510-511 Japanese Gardens: 1000-1000/504-505 Central Dam: 1011/512 (Forcastle sim) Grid Sectors: Premium East: Grid Sector K9, Grid Sector L9 Premium South 1: Grid Sector J8 Premium South 2: Grid Sector J7 Premium South 3: Grid Sector J5, Grid Sector J4 Common features Since all 4 continents are very similar, only for Premium East the maps were finished, since this one is the most complete of them. Tests show that all other continents share the same patterns. All 4 continents are similar, with common geographical features. They contain 70% to 90% residential sims. Their residential sims are created for premium homes (Linden homes). There are 4 themed models of sims. Each themed sim contains themed premium homes, a small central park and small roads (foot paths). There are a few rivers (that end up with large estuaries). The largest river is formed from a dam in center of the continent and then flows East. These Dams are important orientation points. At the border between themed residential sims, there are park sims. A park sim is a made for recreation. The majority of the park sims and all the residential sims have 'no script' enabled. In West, there are two sims with Japanese gardens (they have script enabled). The majority of the shores are unfinished. There is a coast road in West, but it is not used often. The seas and rivers are navigable, but without ship rezz zones, there are not water vehicles on them. Altitude Researches done with an altimeter showed up that majority of the sims forming premium continents are flat plains. Groups with more then 10 sims were found to share nearly same altitude, while other large regions share another Altitude. Separation is sometimes done by park sims. Also, many times you can find at the borders of a flat plain a hill with high declivity that separates it from the next one. These long hills are visible even on the map when the lower plain is at right. Usually, themed sims share the same altitude. Major differences are found in some places along the continents, where multiple plains can be found in the same sim (they expand to other sims). There are at least 3 groups of plains (after average altitude): 20m, 40m and 60m. Maximum altitude seems to be 63 meters throughout the plains. However, since the majority of the sims don't allow scripts, the complete altitude map (like that of Sansara or Heterocera) might have errors. Altitude tests are very similar for all 4 continents, it is like they are a result of cloned Geography. In South-East, near the Japanese gardens, there is a mountain ridge that passes some residential sims. Also, these gardens host the highest mountain of all premium continents, 156 meters high. Subdivisions All 4 continents have large residential areas. There are 4 themed regions: Meadowbrook, Tahoe, Eldergreen and Japanese. As seen on the map, the first one is the largest. Also, there are non-residential places, like parks, land reserve, infohubs or sandboxes. Meadowbrook homes are the most used ones. They cover about half pf the continent and are found mainly in central area and in North. These homes are modern, cubic homes, with large glass walls. Tahoe homes are more rustic. They can be found in South-East. Eldergreen homes are token from wonderland. They are included into nature, covered with vegetation or tree homes. They can be found in South, in 3 distinct places, separated by water. Japanese homes are on the West coast, in two large regions connected by a bridge. They have a coast road. Parks can be found usually at space between themed regions. What is interesting is that parks usually are not flatlands. Many times, you might find hills and slopes filled with water. The infohubs are also surrended by parks. Reserve land is found only in Premium East, in North. Differences Premium East is the first created premium continent and the most complete one. It is nearly the same size with Zindra. It has 8 premium sandboxes (linked into 2 groups). Close to the sandboxes there are the 4 'glitch' sims, with dry desert land and two sims for vehicle rezz. Also, at a small dixtance you can find the premium wilderness sims. It has some uninhabited sims in North-East, for possible new premium homes. Premium South 1 is the smallest and less developed continent. It has no sandbox, just the residential sims and some park sims. Premium south 2 has 4 premium sandboxes united into a single block. The main difference to Premium South 1 is the presence of some extra sims to South-East. Premium South 3 is the second in size and almist identical with Premium South 2. To South, there are some remote sims: the premium snowlands (similar with the snowlands of Sansara and the Premium Railway on 4 sims). Land permissions All the premium continents are Linden owned, so they are mainland. Land here cannot be both or sold. To get land here, you need to make a premium account and request a linden home. You will get for free a parcel of 512 meters of land, with 117 prims allowed. There is no way you can choose on what sim or continent you will have your home. The home will be in a themed residential sim (with homes of the same theme). The house itself has about 60 prims (half of the prim limit). You cannot make major changes to your home. However, you can edit them with a special access menu. The land has some restrictions: no terraform, no skyboxes and no selling (no commerce). Residential sims are made like residential districts in real life, so you cannot be noisy (you cannot make a night club, you cannot shout or do anything that would disturb the neighbors). You can change some land features, like rezz/pushing, script restrictions and you can create ban lines. Since premium land cannot be sold, the only way to get land on another mainland continent (and don't increase land tier) is to abandon land on the premium continent and buy land where you want. Once you got a parcel on a premium continent, you will automatically get a Linden home on it. You cannot move, remove or edit the home. This means you cannot for example paint the walls and windows (except for limited settings, see below). You are not allowed to change size of a prim from the house or make it glow. However, there are a few limited settings. Each home has a control panel close to its entrance. By clicking it, you are able to open a site and change something: chose from a few colors for the exterior, chose window design from existing models or make windows opaque. Some people might complain about intimacy in Premium Continents. Transportation & Road Efficiency There is no automated transportation in Premium continents. Land does not allow both object entry and script entry. the roads existing there (see Premium Continents Network) are really made only for decorative reasons. As a result, the efficiency index is influenced. There also are a few unconnected paths between the premium homes and inside parks, but because of script restrictions their length could not be measured. Premium East: Total road network: 9.50 Sea connection: yes Unconnected road pieces: 5 Continent surface: 23.27 Land coverage: 0.408 Premium South 1: Total road network: 0.18 Sea connection: no Unconnected road pieces: 1 Continent surface: 12.32 Land coverage: 0.015 Premium South 2: Total road network: 7.90 Sea connection: yes Unconnected road pieces: 4 Continent surface: 20.19 Land coverage: 0.391 Premium South 3: Total road network: 7.90 Sea connection: yes Unconnected road pieces: 4 Continent surface: 20.32 Land coverage: 0.389 *Premium East Road efficiency index: 0.170 *Premium South 1 Road efficiency index: 0.008 *Premium South 2 Road efficiency index: 0.148 *Premium South 3 Road efficiency index: 0.147 *Premium East Waterway efficiency index: 0.380 *Premium South 1 Waterway efficiency index: 0.219 *Premium South 2 Waterway efficiency index: 0.287 *Premium South 3 Waterway efficiency index: 0.366 Total transportation efficiency index: *Premium East: 0.550 *Premium South 1: 0.227 *Premium South 2: 0.435 *Premium South 3: 0.513 Premium Continents have the lowest transportation efficiency. This is because road network is small, Waterways are isolated and there are no (or almost no) rezz zones. Accesibility Land Except for sandboxes, wilderness and some special places (listed below), premium continents can be visited by all residents. However, automated transportation does not exist and transportation ways are rare. There is a road in South-West, near the shore, in the Japanese-themed subdivision. Another road is in North-East. A lot of small roads (paths) exist throughout the continent, inside residential sims and in parks, but they are not connected into a continental network. Sailing could be possible, but there are no rezz zones. The only boat rezz zone is in Premium East, between the sandboxes. A boat can be rezzed there and it can sail on a limited surface. Air transportation is also possible (even with current script limitation), if you rezz your plane on a sandbox. Ban lines are very frequent. Since in many places parcels are one near another, it is difficult to walk between houses in some places. About 30% of all premium homes have ban lines. This is no problem for high-altitude flying, anyway. Entity orb teleporters are very rare. While editing the altitude map (which requires an avatar or a bot to visit all sims), our team found only two entity orbs and with a reasonable ejecting time. Other premium places These places can be visited only by premium residents. They are visible on the maps of this article. * Premium sandboxes - Premium East, Premium south 2, Premium South 3, a total of 16 sims * Premium Wilderness - Premium East - 6 sims * Premium desert (gluch) - Premium East, near the sandboxes, 4 sims * Premium rezz zone for vehicles - Premium East, near the sandboxes, 2 sims * Premium snowlands - Premium Sea - 4 sims, see Premium Sea * Premium Railway - Premium Sea - 4 sims Links List Of Continents Premium Continents Network http://community.secondlife.com/t5/English-Knowledge-Base/Linden-Homes/ta-p/700103 - Linden Homes Second Life Geography Category:Grid structures